Chapter 41: | Materialization
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The skills offered were tempting, powerful, even, but now was not the time to weigh my options.
Not with that thing looming before me.
I exhaled slowly, my breath boiling the surrounding currents.
The Overseer towered ahead, a gargantuan leviathan wreathed in shadows.
Hundreds of meters tall, its massive form rippled with tendrils covered in jagged, obsidian spikes.
Even just imagining those nightmare tentacles latching into me made something primal in my mind recoil.
I shivered.
Spines erupted reflexively from my back, and I snapped them off with a sharp twist of my tendrils.
My body shifted into a stance, unorthodox, alien... and yet somehow still familiar.
Even without a humanoid form, I, Alister, could still wield the spear like a born warrior.
But I won't lie to myself.
I was scared.
Then, movement.
Its tentacles vanished into the currents, slicing through the water with impossible speed.
I reacted without thinking.
My tendrils moved in perfect unison, intercepting the strikes, deflecting them with controlled violence.
Blur-Lance Execution Drive.
I shot forward, a blur of motion.
My tendrils danced like silver blades, catching its tentacles mid-swing, twisting around them, and snapping them back.
With a flick, my tail slammed into the Overseer's right eye.
Storm Lacerations.
My tendrils blurred and carved glowing lines into the water, sigils of destruction.
Bright white etchings split across the Overseer's hide like cracks on ancient stone, and then, ruptured.
Its armored flesh tore like wet parchment.
But retaliation came swift.
Pain exploded down my spine as its counterstrike smashed into my back, tentacles like iron whips slamming me upward, then down, cratering me into the seafloor.
My nerves screamed.
More tentacles followed in a blur, a savage flurry that sent blood gushing from my torn exoskeleton.
Bloomrage Apex.
Adrenaline ignited in my veins.
My vision reddened.
My form became a nightmare hue, deep crimson, rippling, burning.
Then.
Stillness.
Only for a breath.
Then chunks of the Overseer's tentacles rained down into the abyss like falling meteorites.
The Overseer froze, stunned.
It hadn't expected me to strike so ruthlessly.
So precisely.
But then, it moved again.
Its tendrils began to blur, mimicking my own style, descending like divine retribution.
Too late.
My spears intercepted its descent mid-flight.
Skewered it.
Pinned it.
I gripped one of my severed tendrils, mana igniting along its length.
With a roar, I hurled it like a javelin, and it punched clean through the Overseer's bloated flesh.
A flash of light.
A rupture across its primary sack.
Then I vanished.
Blur-Lance Execution Drive.
Pushed to its absolute limit, my form blurred and burned across its body, ripping through faster than my tendrils could bear.
They ruptured.
Exploded.
But the damage was done.
Storm Lacerations.
Lines, hundreds of them were etched into the Overseer's flesh and the water around it, glowing with energy.
And then.
Detonation.
The currents warped, torn apart by the force.
Pressure waves rattled the trench.
The sea itself turned red, dyed by the blood of a god-fallen monster.
The Overseer was no more.
And as its remains drifted like dying stars into the deep.
A hologram shimmered into existence before me.
A celebration of my glorious, blood-soaked victory.
---
[You have slain the Overseer of this floor]
• [Crystalhide Nightmare 5★.]
[Flawless Victory achieved.]
[You have gained 10 levels.]
[Access to the next floor unlocked.]
---
[You have successfully devoured]
• [Crystalhide Nightmare 5★]
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[New Skills Acquired:]
• Crystalline Tentacle Plating
• Distributed Neural Cortex
• Mana-Refractive Shell
• Neutral Buoyancy Matrix
• Spiked Dermal Filter
---
[Your grotesque physique would like to devour.]
• Crystalline Tentacle Plating
• Distributed Neural Cortex
• Mana-Refractive Shell
• Neutral Buoyancy Matrix
• Spiked Dermal Filter
[Would you allow it]
[Yes] / [No]
---
So it was a Crystalhide Nightmare...
Yet I couldn't help but wonder, where was the crystalline plating?
Shouldn't it have possessed that signature, translucent armor?
The telltale shimmer of crystallized defense?
Wasn't that the very definition of its species?
The realization struck me like a hollow echo.
I was shocked, but in truth, I couldn't bring myself to care.
I had already devoured its corpse.
I let out a long, exhausted sigh.
Tch... squishy disappointment.
It had been a remarkable opponent in theory, but in execution?
It was just too soft.
With a flex of thought, my tendrils coiled and compressed, warping into a massive, coiled fist.
Then.
BOOM.
The ground cracked and shattered beneath me, fracturing into the void below.
And just like always... a portal spiraled open.
My gut twisted in frustration.
Why does it always have to be a damn gate?
I lamented bitterly.
Why can't I just descend like something normal?
I hated this part.
That moment before entry, knowing full well that my insides would spiral, that gravity would twist and yank at my organs like a cruel child playing with thread.
But I had no other choice.
With a resigned breath, I stepped forward.
My head passed through first.
The abyss swallowed me.
My vision spiraled.
As gravity convulsed.
My body followed, warping... twisting... until I crashed into the world below.
A vast plain spread out before me.
And then, teeth.
A jaw made of mana, gnashing, glowing, snapped toward me.
Instinct roared to life.
My tendrils unfurled and slashed in a wide arc, intercepting the phantom bite in a storm of motion.
Then a shadow loomed above.
Massive.
Terrifying.
A gigantic orca, horned and armored, descended with terrible grace.
Its stomach and vital areas were wrapped in a dense exoskeleton, like carved obsidian steel.
Its aura radiated dominance.
I braced, but too late.
Spheres of compressed water shot forward, gleaming like polished artillery shells.
They detonated as they struck my tendrils, explosions of hydraulic force.
Pain flared white-hot through my nerves. Tendrils snapped.
Blood sprayed.
But others took their place, sprouting mid-fight as I pushed forward, intercepting volley after volley.
The Overseer snarled, low, guttural.
And then.
Darkness.
My vision snapped to black.
Agony bloomed in my skull.
My eyes, were gone.
What?!
I didn't even see the attack.
It didn't move.
There was no projectile, no sign, no hint of magic buildup.
How?
Then it clicked.
It was controlling the water itself.
Not conjuring it, mastering it.
Adrenaline surged.
My vision was gone, as my instincts flared to life.
My form flickered, vanishing.
Then a streak of red energy flashed across the battlefield.
Storm Lacerations.
Countless glowing lines tore into the orca's armored hide, gouging it like cosmic claws.
Its exoskeleton cracked and ruptured under the storm of slashes.
I chuckled.
You thought my vision mattered?
But truly it didn't matter.
I could feel you.
I could see your position.
But just as I regained my momentum, impact crashed.
A hammer of force slammed into my skull like divine punishment.
My body rocketed down, my face crashing into the seafloor with earth-shattering violence.
A crater split open beneath me, and pain bloomed like fire in my shattered nerves.
The Overseer wasn't finished yet.
And neither was I.
But I couldn't retaliate.
Pain lanced through my back, hot, immediate, blinding.
My flesh warped, twisted unnaturally, then burst apart, chunks of meat and sinew spilling into the currents in a grotesque bloom of red.
Boom.
A massive hammer descended from above, not metaphorical, but real, impossibly heavy.
It pinned me, crushed me into the ocean floor with an impact so thunderous the ground beneath me cracked open.
My skull rang, pressure building behind my eyes, nerves singing with agony.
My head shuddered, not from shock, but from raw concussive force.
And then, it bit.
I felt a teeth, massive, jagged, and unrelenting, sink into my exoskeleton.
They gnashed, grinding down the bone-like plates, tearing through the tougher tissue beneath.
Chunks of flesh were ripped out, scattered across the dark like crimson constellations.
And yet...
I chuckled.
Low and broken at first, then rising, manic, gurgling with blood and delight.
How dumb could it be?
From my ruined frame, tentacles burst forth, writhing and twitching with unspent malice.
They blurred, not even the water could catch their movement.
Then, the warmth.
That gratifying, intimate warmth, of being inside a body.
Yes.
I was inside.
My tendrils pierced deep, skewering it from the inside out.
Organs were shredded.
Bones cracked.
Blood sprayed.
With a violent twist and a forceful sweep, its insides were turned to slurry, its body was ripped apart like a wet parchment.
I roared with laughter.
Bwahahaha!
This, this was the moment I'd been waiting for.
The exact second it let its guard down.
And I devoured it.
But before I could savor the final swallow.
AGONY.
A sharp, enormous object lodged into my back, cleaving through layers of muscle and plating.
A new wave of pain exploded down my spine.
How?
Confusion tore through me.
It was dead.
I killed it.
I felt it die.
So then.
Why?
Why could I still feel it?
Why was my flesh still being torn?
Disbelief clouded my mind, but my instincts surged, screaming.
My senses snapped to attention.
The gentle swaying of bladed grass in the currents... something was moving.
A shift in pressure.
A churn of the water.
The subtle but unmistakable drag of something massive stirring toward me.
And then, the sound of its maw opening wide.
It was coming.
I didn't move.
I waited.
Coiled like a predator.
Holding, breathing, tasting the moment.
Closer.
Closer.
Then, now.
My tendrils snapped together, forming a claw edged with raw mana.
In the blink of an eye, it swiped downward, slicing the water apart with a soundless scream.
And I felt it, that resistance.
That ripping.
That tear of flesh caught in motion.
Blood erupted, infusing the water with a thick, dark cloud.
My claw had split its side wide open.
Its body reeled, twitching in panic, but I gave no mercy.
My maw descended, massive and ravenous, snapping shut around its exposed flesh.
CRUNCH.
Tendons tore.
Bone gave way.
Like a starved beast, I ripped it apart, limb by limb, chunk by chunk.
And I devoured every last piece.
I didn't care what it was, or how it had faked its death.
I consumed it until nothing remained.
Then, a soft chime.
A hologram shimmered before me, congratulating my victory.
But I didn't respond.
I merely let out a long, exhausted sigh, and let my monstrous body collapse onto the seafloor, my limbs twitching from exertion.
The battle was over.
For now.
---
[You have slain the Overseer of this floor.]
• [Horned Abyssal Orca 5★]
[Flawless Victory achieved.]
[You've let the Overseer feel despair. Additional levels granted.]
[You have gained 15 levels.]
[Access to the next floor.]
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